


Never Seeing, Always Watching

by KatLeePT



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-23
Updated: 2016-03-23
Packaged: 2018-05-28 14:38:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6333016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KatLeePT/pseuds/KatLeePT
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sarah watches the stars and wonders.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Seeing, Always Watching

She looks up at the stars and wonders if he can see the same shining and sparkling lights from underground. She wonders, if he does, what he makes of them. What kind of myths might the Goblins have made up concerning them? Surely they don't realize that they are actually balls of gas burning millions and millions of miles away. No, they would think them something magical, and knowing their King, he probably thinks he can rule them, too.

She sighs, her smile falling, as she thinks the latter, but she knows it's true. That's why she couldn't stay. He would never have stopped trying to bend her and Toby to his rule. She'd considered, once, offering to stay in the place of her baby brother for she truly hated that Jareth was lonely, but she'd soon figured out that that would do no good. He would never bargain for what he wanted. He was the King, and he expected every one to live by his rule.

What if she had? she wonders not for the first time. What if she had stayed? Toby would have been a Goblin, she thinks, and she could not have allowed that condemnation. Her baby brother hadn't been old enough to know what was happening, let alone to make such a life-long decision, and besides, who wants to be a Goblin, any way?

Oh, but how she had felt when Jareth had drawn her close to him underneath similarly sparkling lights! There was a lot of magic in that land, but there was no magic like what he possessed. It wasn't even the actual magic he owned, the sorcery with which he could turn back time or take any disguise he chose. It was the magic in his arms, in his rare smile, in the twinkle of his bi-colored eyes. She sighs, remembering that night and how it had felt to dance close to him.

She had lied to get Toby out of that land. Jareth had wielded power over her unlike anything she'd ever felt before or since. Before him, before that journey in his Kingdom, she could not have even imagined feeling the way he made her feel. The pull just to be in his arms was greater than any True Love's kiss in any storybook, and if he had kissed her, she surely would have been lost.

Would it have been such a great loss? It would have been for Toby, but she's often thought she would have been happier there. She was happy in his arms until she remembered her brother. She would have been in Heaven had he kissed her, but she hadn't been able to let that happen.

She shakes her head, trying to stop her memories that never quite leave her entirely alone. She is a grown woman now. She has no time for idle daydreams over what might have been or a land that no one else even knows exists. She has no time for waltzing under the stars or making wishes on them. Those are things for a spoiled, little girl who has yet to grow into her own mind, but she is a woman now.

She has responsibilities as always she's had, but now, she truly cares for them. She needs to get home, make supper for Toby, help him with his homework, and tuck him into bed. God knows her stepmother doesn't care to be a mother to either of them, and so she's had to become the mother herself. For just a moment more, she wonders: Could Jareth and she have raised Toby themselves? Could she have ever convinced him not to make her brother into a Goblin but to let them both stay there with him and be happy, be human, be mortal?

But that's exactly the problem. She doesn't know for certain, but she believes he is Immortal. She could have never truly defeated him if the spell to win hadn't been right there in the book. She wonders how many other girls have been taken by him, how many babies changed into Goblins. He wasn't a good man, she reminds herself. He wasn't kind, no matter what he said. He lied just as she did. He was cruel and never would have let them have the freedom to live their lives their way. Once in that labyrinth, if she hadn't spoken the words, they would have bought been trapped forever.

So she lied, but she's never regretted anything more. Every day, she wonders what he's doing, if he's taken a new girl into his world. Every night, she wonders if he looks upon the same stars and if he ever thinks of her. In every dream, she waltzes again in his arms, feels the press of his lips against hers, and, for a short time, is whole again. And every night, as she hurries home to the brother she risked everything to save and tries to fight her memories and her tears, she never sees the dark silhouette winging its way along the stars and clouds, following her home, following her always, and loving her, mortal though she is, from a far greater distance than words or hopes could ever travel. She never sees him, but he always watches her.

  
**The End**

**Author's Note:**

> All characters within belong to their rightful owners, not the author, and are used without permission.


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